Note: We would like to once more apologize for the gross negligence of the Bunker’s Administration department for letting the normally sedate schedule run amok. We have no excuse for them. Only our derision.
Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (in theaters)
Miles Morales, aka Spider-Man, continues his journey as Brooklyn’s friendly neighborhood super hero du jour, and also misses his Spider-verse friends from the first movie—in particular, Gwen Stacy, aka Spider-Gwen. But a dark matter super villain named The Spot has plans to become Spidey’s nemesis, and what starts out as a comical interlude soon becomes a threat that could mean the end of the Spider-Verse.
When Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse dropped during the Christmas season in 2018, it was a surprise smash hit for any number of reasons you’d care to list: the story was fresh and utilized the current version of Spider-Man from the Ultimates universe; it also folded in a number of other version of Spider-Man from mass media over the years, including, but not limited to, Peter Porker, the Spectacular Spider-Ham; and of course, was a dazzling visual tour-de-force, seamlessly blending multiple animation and art styles into a constantly moving collage that resulted in the most respectful cinematic adaptation of a comic book, ever.
In fact, Into the Spider-Verse was the most faithful “comic book” movie ever made, in that it was exactly like how it felt to read a comic book. It was an astounding visual feat, integrating sound effects as both audio and visual components in the film, along with animation that felt like panel transitions across a page.
Now we’re at the sequel, after a delay of six years. Not surprising that they would choose to double down on the art styles, resulting in a number of visual flourishes and references that are instantly recognizable to long-time comic book readers, such as the 90’s Ben Reilly/Clone Spider-Man, complete with staccato, clipped dialogue boxes that gave me a flashback to 1994. Oh, and speaking of captions! Editorial asides?! Are you kidding me?
I don’t think the production team broke any new ground so much as they continued with the ground they were breaking. The movie still looks hand-drawn, even though there were a thousand animators involved. But the greatest trick they pulled? For those of you who never grew up reading comics every month, there was a particularly sweet agony that came from turning to the last page of a story you were completely and totally invested in, only to see, for example, the reveal of the big villain who’d been tormenting said hero this whole time, and it’s a giant splash page, and across the bottom of the page, it says, “To Be Continued...!” and you screamed “NOOOOOOO!”
Yeah, well, welcome to comic books, suckers. I only hope the third movie doesn’t take six years. That would feel like, I dunno, a whole month, back in 1978.
If you were ever a Spider-Man fan of any stripe—video games, Saturday morning cartoons, comics, The Electric Company, you name it: this movie is a full-fledged celebration of the possibilities of comics, of heroism, of fantasy storytelling. It’s a beautiful magic trick. Highly recommended. Insistently so. Don’t do that thing everyone does where they say, “Oh, imma wait for streaming.” Don’t do that. Go to a theater and let yourself be overwhelmed and amazed by the visuals and the sensations. You won’t regret it.
I was remembering back to our old Chessex days. Shortly after meeting you the subject turned to Robert E Howard. When I mentioned one of my favorite of his books was “A Gent From Bear Creek” I think that’s when we hit it off!
Then the subject turned to Elvis and we were finishing each other’s sentences.
Jesus, we even like the same type of aftershave.
I loved Into The Spiderverse and with yoir recommendation, I don’t think there’s any way I won’t like this one.
Ragan and I both literally gasped "Nooooooooo!" when we realized it was a cliffhanger ending. Absolutely love these movies.